* A note* Over the last 2 weeks of my trip i really slacked at my blog. It wasnt pure laziness. It was possibly the most jam packed, exhausting, and fun 2 weeks of my life. On one hand I had to just enjoy it, and second, it had to be written the right way..back to journal - * Well the motivation weaned today, I woke up 3 in the afternoon. I didn't start walking out the door until 4, unsure of what to expect. Then the kind of thing happens, which just makes travelling epic, something that doesn't happen in real-life. I meet this Young...

Before I started the trip, since it was so open-ended I made a conscious decision to choose a random place in Asia and just go. It's the craziest, least cost effective thing I've ever done in my life, but there's no chance to do it again. I juggled with visiting hong long, shanghai, Taiwan, phillipines. But after some talking to some Canadians earlier in the trip, I couldn't shake going to one place. I had to go to Korea. Hey, their hoards of tourists are always taking pictures elsewhere, thought id return the favor! But seriously, what...

Pete visited Seoul today and things were fine. This will be his last visit to Seoul during this contract, since the ship will be changing it's home port to Hong Kong in a couple of weeks. He still has another visitor two to Jeju and Busan in South Korea before he starts making more stops in Japan. As of today, he has traveled 62,587 miles since he left Indianapolis 26 weeks ago.

Pete checked in from Seoul where they had an overnight stay. That made for kind of a weird performance set-up on the ship. The band was scheduled to play a big band set in the evening but, with the passengers free to stay in town late, there were only about 50 passengers expected to even be on the ship during their set so they weren't expecting a big crowd. They did play, though, and it went fine. Several of the guys from the band went into the port town of Incheon to see the sights and get something to eat. The highlight was apparently...

Pete had a fine visit in Seoul where he took a tour of the city. He sent many pictures from the tour. The lead singer who knocked his tooth out was planning to be seen by a dentist in Seoul to see if his tooth could be repaired. Pete says he has a significant "hillbilly" look right now! Everything else is going well.

Pete checked in from Seoul and things were going well. He sent a picture of a large vat of Sangria that was the featured refreshment from the crew's "Sangria Party" the night before. Because they are bringing the new singers and dancers into the performance schedule, they had some extra technical rehearsals during the day so Pete did not leave the ship in Seoul. The new performers have recently been in rehearsal in Miami so things were going pretty smoothly already.

Pete checked in from Seoul and things were going well. The weather has been fine where he is, despite the tropical storms in Japan, etc. He and Andy are continuing to communicate through What's App, a service on their smart phones which allow them to leave voice messages as well as text messages and pictures at a low or no extra fee.

Pete checked in from Seoul and things are fine. He and Andy are using some new technology to communicate - Instagram for pictures and What's App for voice messages - and the results are very good. He sent a couple of good pictures from the Great Wall (which I will post later) and Andy was able to send him a picture of Andy and I with Pete's clarinet teacher from IU, Mr. Klug and his wife, who we ran into at a summer band concert in Bloomington this week.

Pete called from Seoul and things are going well. They have an overnight stay in Seoul so will probably have a little longer time to explore the city but, as usual, the Royal Caribbean port is a long way away from the city so they will have to figure out transportation that will work within their time constraints. So far, they had mostly spent their time eating BBQ! From the pictures, it looks like he and his friends are having fun.

so the 5 of FEB come and i left the hostel in the morning and went to the hotel that mom booked,it was not that far from my hostel, she arrival around 11Am with just hire small bag, she have a counteraction flight in Russia bat it was to short between the flight, less then a hour, so she catch the flight barley and the luggage cent make it in time, so it take two days and we have to be stake for three days in Hanoi.
the first day was slow and nice my mom went to sleep and then we go around the city talking about people i didnt seen for a...

Cold Crisp ...will add pictures in 2 days
Hotel was Great.....
We where not ust to the cold ....on tour to the palace the ground was fully frozen....even with 3 pairs of socks my lightweight shoes where not working...
Subway was intimidating at first. Our first tour to the DMZ they left us at City Hall. We where like now what?? the tour agent saw the terror in our eye and took us right away to the hotel we where staying by taxie. The next day we took the subway and decided that....that was not so bad

after 6h from Kunming I arrive to Hokuo, 2 in the morning and I have to sleep in the bus until the morning come.
I start the day in 6am tray to find the way to the border, I didn't want to take a taxi so I start walking in the way I think is the rite way for me, and I find out that I was in the rite way I find a bus number 5 that take me a short walking distends from the border, I have my lest noddle in china and cost the border to Vietnam.
I start of running from all the taxi and the bikes in the border entry and looking for money the...